Dr Who: Next Doctor: Blu Ray Review

Dr Who: Next Doctor: Blu Ray Review

The Next Doctor - Blu Ray
Rating: PG
Released by BBC/ Roadshow Entertainment
This 2008 Christmas special found itself the centre of much speculation coming after David Tennant's announcement he would be moving on from the show.
Writer Russell T Davies clearly delighted in the ambiguity of this tale which finds Tennant's Doctor on Christmas Eve in 1861 - and arriving in Victorian London, the Doc's thrown into a mystery which involves plenty of missing bodies.
Teaming with Jackson Lake (a wonderful David Morrissey), the Doc soon discovers the Cybermen are back on the scene - but he's not accounted for Lake's perception that he is firmly of the belief that he is the Doctor.
It all culminates in a rather silly pastiche of the Iron Giant with the Cyber King rising and threatening to crush London.
But it's in Tennant and Morrissey's performance that this episode succeeds. The pair offer up a masterclass in acting and along with Dervla Kirwan's evil Miss Hartigan. Coupled with the high quality of the HD with Blu Ray, this is a fairly disposable piece of Who entertainment. Which is all very well for a light fluffy Christmas audience, but long term viewing it's only thanks to the human acting of Kirwan, Morrissey and Tennant that this holds up
Extras: A behind the scenes doco and concert at London's Proms make up the rest of this disc - The Proms are worth seeing; the doco is the usual standard stock fare.

Rating: 6/10